Pocket Full of Posy
by Dogmatix
Summary: previously my drabble collection, but it turned into a fic.   Alex is hurt, Dana is worried, and they're both crashing in a strange apartment in the City that Never Sleeps.
1. Humpty Dumpty

Disclaimer: I do not own Prototype.  
>Note: set post-game<p>

Humpty Dumpty

Alex collapsed heavily against the thin door, scrabbling blindly for the knob as he held himself together through sheer willpower. Finding the cold metal, he turned it automatically and stumbled into the apartment, barely managing not to land flat on the floor. "Dana," he croaked.

Losing his balance, he sagged against a wall, putting a hand up to brace himself. The hand shimmered, flickering into red and black strands of biomass that yearned to fall away into chaos.

"Dana!" Alex forced his hand into coherence.

Still bleary from sleep, Dana emerged from her room. "I'm up, I'm up, what's the – Ohmygod! Alex!" Dana rushed to his side, then stopped short, indecision plain on her face. "What-?"

Alex made the decision for her, pushing heavily off from the wall and all but collapsing onto Dana. "Bathroom," he managed, feeling his insides start to rebel in earnest.

Turning a deaf ear to her questions, Alex helped as much as he could, pushing himself forward sporadically as Dana all but dragged him into the small bathroom. "Fuck, you're heavy," she grit out as they made it. "Wait, are you running a _fever?_"

With one last heave, Alex made it to the bathtub and flipped the toggle to close the drain.

He hoped for a fleeting second that Dana's goodwill was as strong as she thought it was, because she was about to have her nose rubbed in the fact that he was far from human. Alex Mercer's physical form dissolved into pure biomass as the Blacklight virus fought desperately to eject the new acid/antivirus/poison Blackwatch had managed to tranq him with. Mental coherence dissolved a moment later, and Alex knew no more.


	2. All the King's Horses

Disclaimer: I do not own Prototype.  
>Note: set post-game, follows on from the first drabble. Rambling train-of-thought Dana ahead.<p>

All the King's Horses

Dana sat on the toilet lid, staring fixedly at the bathtub. Red and black coils rippled from one side of the tub to the other, like wavelets. Like breathing.

It had been two days already, and the, the thing- '_Alex_,' she corrected herself firmly. It- _he _was still Alex, still her brother… but human? No.

She'd thought she was dealing with it, with having her brother infected like this, a living virus. After coming out of the coma, he'd treated her like spun glass until she'd finally snapped and ripped him up one side and down the other, declaring that she a grown girl, that she could take care of herself, and other meaningless bullshit. And even as he growled and grumbled, he'd looked so… so _happy_.

She hadn't seen him look that happy since they were kids, and even then only rarely. It wasn't like Alex. Alex wasn't like Alex. She stared at the mess of infectious virus in her bathtub and felt her breathing grow heavy, erratic. Was he Alex? Really? Clearly he wasn't human. There was no body hidden away in that tub, it was all formless, heaving, feverish biomass, through and through. Was it like those horror movies, where people who get turned into vampires automatically become slaving, bloodthirsty, and cruel? Only, that wasn't it, was it. She felt… fuck, she felt _safer_ around her brother the monstrous, murderous, infectious terrorist than she'd felt around her brother the rising star of science for, for years.

She reached out and put a firm hand on her spastically bouncing knee. Fuck, how much coffee had she had? Better yet, how long had she been awake? Rubbing her eyes, she leaned back against the toilet's tank.

After Alex's dramatic entrance, she'd stood there nervously for an hour, then decided that she couldn't help and was just driving herself nuts, and shouldn't she get something constructive done or, better yet, go back to bed? Yeah, that had lasted all of five minutes before she was back in the bathroom again.

At first, the biomass had writhed and turned, a couple of strands boiling over the side only to be slurped back in. When it finally quieted down, Dana had scraped up her courage and leaned in for a closer look, curious despite herself.

A thin oily film, semi-opaque, had formed over the red-and-black, and she'd reached out one hand without thinking. Before she could even blink, her wrist had been caught by a feverishly warm curl of biomass. She thought she might have squeaked, but the icy flood of fear – instinctive and immediate – made it hard to remember. It had held her wrist for a moment, then relaxed, sinking back into the main body.

Okay, no touchy.

The biomass had felt almost like a snake without skin, pure squeezing muscle and squelchy gobs of- of- Y'know what, she wasn't going to think about it. That had been her first coffee. Black. Lots of sugar.

Once, she'd decided she was fed up with the whole thing, drawn the shower curtain and stomped out. Ten minutes later she was back, unable to get the drawn shower curtain out of her mind. She'd actually hesitated before jerking it open again, a hundred late-night horror movies suddenly raising her hackles in sick dread. Nothing had changed. Then, as now, Alex-the-virus still lay in the tub like an obscene black-and-red bowl of string cheese.

She huffed a punch-drunk laugh, thinking back on it. "string cheese," she muttered to herself, not knowing or caring that her eyes were already drifting closed.


	3. Walls and Falls

Disclaimer: I do not own Prototype.  
>Note: set post-game, follows on from the first and second drabbles. Really I should go ahead and find a title for this thing because I don't think it still qualifies as a drabble. So yeah, part the third, wherein I attempt to write action!<p>

Walls and Falls

Her neck had a crick in it something awful. Blinking sleep out of her eyes, Dana massaged her aching neck. What-?

Oh. The bathroom. Right. She must have fallen asleep at some stage. Eying the small window blearily, she judged that it was late afternoon. She glanced towards the bath. Alex's biomass still rippled slowly, evenly. Here she'd been freaking out for the past two days and her brother was taking a nap. She took it all back, that was Alex through and through.

Urgh, she needed to pee. NOT in here. The apartment across the hall was still deserted, maybe she could use the bathroom there.

She staggered out of the cramped little room, yawning and scrubbing a hand through her hair. Man, even her scalp ached. She undid the chain and stuck her head into the hallway, more out of habit than anything else. The hallway was empty, except for some shlub leaning against the wall a few doors down, ipod earbuds firmly in place and bopping his head in time to unheard music.

Dana pulled back, closed the door and locked it, then secured the door chain. The Infected were being systematically eradicated, sure, but that didn't mean it was safe, not by a long shot. _Nobody_ went around oblivious to the world anymore, not when the Infected could still be anywhere, anyone.

"Ugh, stop being so paranoid," she groused to herself. But the feeling persisted. Irritated, she marched over to the window facing the street five stories below. She knew she was being ridiculous, but…

Black vans stood parked here and there , interspersed with a broken down SUV and a taxi or two. Another van pulled up right in front of her building. Nobody got out. The streets were empty of people.

Dana stared in mounting horror. Black-clad men started to slip from the new black van, moving quietly an efficiently into her building.

"Alex," she said as she kneeled by the bathtub. She kept her voice even, but urgent. "Alex, you need to wake up. You need to wake up right the fuck now because I think Blackwatch found us.

A knock at the front door. "Ms. Mercer?"

"Alex, damnit!" Dana barked, grabbing a toothbrush off the sink and poking her brother sharply with it. "Alex wake up!"

Small white flecks like congealed grease scattered and shifted over Alex's surface as biomass clutched the plastic hilt of the toothbrush in a swirl of muscle, and Dana yanked as hard as she could, "Alex!"

Someone banged on the door.

The biomass shivered, and somehow Alex was just _there_, his top half at least, the bottom edges of the jacket still melting into the red-and-black mass. "Wh-at?"

"Blackwatch is here!"

The door broke open, yanked to a stop with a clink of chain.

"Shit!" Alex grabbed for her, hanging on to her shoulders as they both staggered upright. Alex was still unsteady, his face showing strain as he literally pulled himself together. "We need to get out."

"How?"

Something slammed into the front door, sending it crashing open. Voices roared.

Alex punched out towards the small bathroom window, arm twisting into strands that shot deep into drywall, plaster, and exterior brick. With a grunt, he yanked back, bringing a large chunk of the wall into the bathroom with a crash and a cloud of dust. "Come on!" Alex pulled her towards the gaping hole.

"What?" Dana shrilled, almost frozen with fear. They were five stories off the fucking ground and there wasn't a fire escape or even a damned ledge, where the fuck were they supposed to go?

"Trust me!" Alex yelled as he dragged her forwards, and then he was collapsing onto her again, dissolving into biomass and flowing around her, hot and heavy and clammy. For a moment she was completely frozen, deaf and blind in an airless prison, then Alex pulled back from her face and moved her forwards.

He was covering her like a suit of armour, but this armour moved her, instead of the other way around. "Alex!" she screamed as the armour launched itself out the hole, bullets thudding into their back and pushing them forward. "Aleeeeeex!" she screwed her eyes shut as they burst out of the building, felt one arm move and catch the wall and then they were off, running _up the side of the goddamned building_.

They pushed off from the brick at impossible speed, and Dana screamed instinctively, doing her best to curl up into a protective ball but the suit fought her, making her limbs move, flipping her in midair to land feet-first on the roof of the building across the street, but her struggling had had some effect and they landed poorly, going into an awkward roll and skidding over ten feet of gravel before coming to a breathless stop.

"Sstop fighting me," Alex's warped voice came from somewhere as the suit stood up, starting to move again as bullets bit the ground around them. Snipers?

"Let me go," Dana said, forcing her voice to steady. This was insane!

"Can't. You'll be a sitting duck. Just do what I tell you and you'll be fine." The suit started running again, and Dana could just tell they were going to start jumping buildings. "Oh goooooohhhhhhhddddddd!"

"Pretend you're Wonder Woman!" Alex snapped, and then they were airborne.

Dana swallowed a scream as they jumped, trying to pretend it was all a movie or a video game or a _really fucked up dream._ She didn't know if that worked, or if the terror just couldn't go any higher after a while, but about ten buildings later she found herself getting into the rhythm of it. Unfortunately, the black helicopter she hadn't even noticed had caught up to them by that time. "Left!" Alex yelled, and if Dana didn't help, at least she didn't fight the sudden swerve to the left. An explosion boomed behind them and the suit was jumping her out into empty air, tilting her forward and then- something happened with the planes and angles of the suit, Dana could see it out of the corner of an eye, and they were moving forward, moving faster – they were gliding!

Not for long though. Three seconds later they hit the side of a building and Alex was horizontal and running again. Up and over the building they went, then down, slipping past a bunch of buildings and finally slipping down into the subway. It was almost sunset outside, and with night coming the station was deserted. Trains stopped running at sundown.

Alex fell away from her, collapsing heavily on the cold cement floor. Dana had grown almost used to Alex's burning heat, leaving the cool evening air an icy shock to her skin. She sat down hard. For a moment neither of them moved.

Alex was still human-shaped, although he was shuddering violently. Dana had about a million questions and decided to start at the top of the list. "What the _fucking hell_ is going on!"

"Poison," Alex groaned, flopping over onto his back and giving her a weary, worn-out look. "Some new thing… Blackwatch pumped into me. S'like… a really strong base."

"What?"

Alex's eyes closed. "Base. Basic and acidic. Like in chemistry. It's another virus, but they've engineered … engineered it to make a base. To _be_ a base. Like. Super soap. Dissolving me from the inside out. "

Dana grunted in realization. "That white stuff, the white flecks on you-"

Alex nodded once. "I can fight it, I can win… get it out of me and kill it… but I can't do anything else at the same time or… or it gains on me."

Dana felt cold. Every moment Alex stayed.. cohesive, human, whatever, was another moment he wasn't fighting this thing. "We have to find somewhere to hole up."

"Yeah." But he wasn't moving.

"Come on," Dana said, getting an arm under his back and pulling. "Get up, we're moving."

"Can't be too close," Alex said weakly, "they'll track us. Go right from here."

"Whatever you say," Dana agreed, anything to get them moving. She got them up the stairs and two whole damn blocks away before she judged Alex to look about as bad as he had two days ago. There was an apartment building to their left that looked deserted. She steered them towards it, made it up to the third floor in an elevator that miraculously still worked(she took it as a good omen) and into the first unlocked apartment she could find.

Two minutes later, Alex was puddled in the bathtub again, and Dana was curled up against the inside of the bathroom door in a nest of towels. Not much of a warning system, but paranoia insisted she try.


	4. A Song of Sixpence

I borrowed heavily from Fake for the new characters, although I'm not sure about how OOC people are, since it's been a while since I read the series. But they're characters in New York that I don't have to build from scratch, so I went with it. (There will be some reference to m/m relationship, but not as a central element)

A Song of Sixpence

Randy McLane heaved a relieved sigh as he shuffled into their apartment, suitcases having gotten heavier by the minute. It was glorious to be back home, even with New York in the middle of what felt like a war zone. _Was_ a war zone for all intents and purposes.

He was tempted to dump the bags in the foyer. Dee would have. But he wasn't his partner, so he dragged the darn things all the way to their bedroom before letting them drop. God he was tired. He toyed with the idea of falling into bed, but he was already heading to the bathroom as he thought it.

The door stuck. Or no, not stuck, exactly. There was something behind the door. Something heavy. He pushed the door again. Someone grunted.

Shit. Squatters? ' Wonderful time not to have your gun on you, McLane,' he berated himself as he backed quickly away.

"Alex!" came a muffled yell. There was a flurry of activity and a thud from behind the door before it was yanked open, revealing… a young woman. Short hair in disarray, she stared out in wild-eyed panic.

They eyed each other for a tense moment, then the woman let out a shaky breath. "You're not…" she trailed off. "Who are you?"

"Randy McLane. I live here."

"Uh. Oh," the woman said sheepishly. "Well. I'm Dana. It's uh, nice to meet you." She flushed. "We'll leave, you don't have to call the cops or anything. We just needed a place to crash."

"We?"

"Me and my older brother," she said reluctantly, glancing worriedly back over her shoulder.

"He's injured?" Randy asked, worried. Not exactly a surprise, given what was going on in the city. "Do you want help getting him to a hospital?"

"No!" she said, looking anxious. "No hospitals. Thanks, but he just needs a place to rest. He'll be fine."

Randy wavered. If the brother was too hurt to speak, he really should be in the hospital or at least a decent bed, but the young woman, Dana, didn't have that desperate edge to her voice that spoke of trying to convince herself as much as anyone else. And all this was supposing she was even telling the truth – this was New York, after all.

Oh hell, Dee would probably kill him for this, but, "You can stay here," he offered, taking a step forward. Immediately the door swung a bit more closed. He stopped. The worry on her face was real. "I won't hurt you, miss. I can help you move your brother to the bedroom, I'm sure he'd be more comfortable there."

"No, I think we're fine here," Dana said, frowning anxiously but still blocking the door.

Randy stayed silent, waiting.

"It's hard to explain," Dana continued after a moment, "but he's good where he is. Look. Like I said, we'll leave, we don't want any trouble."

"No," Randy said with a shake of his head. "I'd feel better knowing you were okay here rather than out on the street."

"We'll just find another empty apartm-" Dana stopped short and blushed. "Um."

Either she was a really excellent liar, or this Dana wasn't used to breaking into other people's homes. "It's not a problem," Randy smiled reassuringly as he took a step back and watched Dana relax fractionally.

"Oh. Well." Dana threw one last look back over her shoulder, paused for a moment, then sighed. "Thanks. Really."

Randy nodded. "Good night, then."

"Yeah. Good night," she returned and made to close the door, but paused. Glanced at him a little askance. "Why the hell are you being so nice?"

"It's a personal failing. I'm working on it," he said deadpan.

She huffed, amused. "Right. Good night."

Randy stood looking at the closed door. Dee was going to kill him. His cellphone was in his carry on bag, and he supposed he should go find it. If only to let his partner know not to shoot the people in the bathroom when Dee got back from checking in at the station house.


End file.
